On October 10th, Jim will serve on the panel “The Biggest Problems and New Ideas in Health IT” at Becker’s Annual Health IT + Revenue Cycle Conference. As part of an ongoing series, Becker’s is talking to healthcare leaders who plan to speak at the conference, which will take place October 9-12, 2019 in Chicago.
To learn more about the conference and Jim’s session, click here.
Question: What does healthcare need more of? Less of?
Jim Jamieson: Healthcare needs more collaboration. Collaboration between departments. Collaboration with patients. Collaboration with payers. And, collaboration with vendor partners. You see evidence and momentum in this area every day. Barriers are being broken between clinical and financial aspects of a hospital, bringing people together to solve challenges that were traditionally tackled independently. Patients are encouraged to play a more active role in the decisions made with regard to their healthcare. And the vendor role is transforming, sometimes dramatically, as health systems blur the lines between in-sourcing and outsourcing, by acquiring organizations to do vital tasks and offer innovative solutions, but not core work for the hospital. Collaboration lets everyone play at the top of their game.
In order to foster an environment of collaboration, healthcare needs fewer boundaries. We can no longer operate the way things have always been done. We must begin to question why, and why not. Why are we doing things the way we do them now? Isn’t there a better way? It is time to question assumptions. And why not try something different or see things from a unique perspective? True innovation bubbles up from breaking down the often internally built walls we establish for ourselves. I find this to be true personally, within my own company, and see it on a larger scale with healthcare in general.
Q: What is one topic or issue you’ve been investing time in to better understand as of late?
JJ: In a word, adoption. As a healthcare technology firm that provides clinical decision support to providers in a whole new way, we are constantly faced with helping providers know when to use our tool. We know when they do, we will reduce their documentation to seconds, enhance their relationships with their patients, mitigate risk, and help them deliver better quality care. Those who “see” it, adopt with vigor. Getting to that AHA moment varies for each provider and remains our number one goal.
We know hospitals face the same challenges…getting providers to adopt to new clinical standards of care or new hospital policies. Providers, on the other hand, are bombarded with messages and demands and have very little time or energy to add one more thing to their repertoire. In their specialty alone, providers would have to read 160 hours a week just to remain current on the clinical advancements in their field. We have to find a better way to put digestible and actionable information in the hands of the provider to help them do what they do best. Only then will they begin to adopt the innovations available to them.
Q: What contributes to better conversations between a health system’s financial and clinical leaders?
JJ: This is a great question and addresses one of the things I think has been a void in healthcare. Traditionally, even typically, hospitals are very siloed in their approach to managing their business. Healthcare providers are responsible for clinical outcomes and patient satisfaction and the financial folks worry about getting paid for it. But we know now that that can’t work. Opening dialog between clinical and financial leaders requires, first of all, empathy…a clear understanding of the challenges each of the leaders face. But, even more importantly, and open mind to the fact that each is vital to the other achieving success.
My company, EvidenceCare, has created a tool to help facilitate blurring the clinical and financial lines for a hospital. We have created a Clinical Revenue Cycle Optimization (CRCO) tool that helps providers deliver better quality care, while improving the financial position for a hospital by reducing denials and realizing vital revenue. Essentially, we put the provider on the revenue cycle team and do so completely within their existing workflow. Most tools today either support or propel a hospital clinically OR financially. We have found hospitals hunger for tools that actually bridge the two and create a channel for shared communication and shared success. Putting everyone on the same team contributes to better conversations between a health system’s financial and clinical leaders.
At Becker's 4th Annual CEO + CFO Roundtable, taking place November 2–5 in Chicago, more than 1,500 hospital and health system executives tackle decisions that determine whether organizations thrive or merely survive: protecting margins under cost pressure, choosing where to grow, renegotiating payer relationships, stabilizing the workforce and proving real ROI on technology. This is where leaders work through them together, face-to-face. Apply for complimentary registration now.
